


Eunoia

by merthurlin



Category: Friends at the Table (Podcast)
Genre: M/M, Pacific Rim AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-27
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-10-17 18:27:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17565716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merthurlin/pseuds/merthurlin
Summary: If you were to ask any random person on the streets about the Jaegers, the first one they would mention is the Solar Apostle. Undefeated for nearly ten years, the Jaeger was truly the icon of the program, a pinnacle feat of engineering and human ingenuity.It helped that its pilots were so bizarre. The public loves the eccentric, and Samothes and Samot were as eccentric as they come.





	Eunoia

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ThunderstormsandMemories](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThunderstormsandMemories/gifts).



“Is it true?” Hella asked, slightly out of breath as she jogged to catch up to Hadrian.

“Is what true?” He replied, distracted by the tablet document he was currently reading. It was detailing his latest simulation scores, and he was already doing the mental calculations of how much time he could log in at the stimulation room before the next assessment, to work on some of his weak points. Fleetingly, he wondered if Hella would join him. Probably yes.

“You mean you haven’t heard?” Hadrian saw Hella throwing him an incredulous look from the corner of his eyes, and he frowned, turning to look at her. They easily sidestepped a pair of newer recruits as they entered the cafeteria, which even Hadrian could see was louder than usual.

“Heard what?”

“Solar Apostle is breaking up.”

Hadrian dropped his tablet.

\---

If you were to ask any random person on the streets about the Jaegers, the first one they would mention is the Solar Apostle. Undefeated for nearly ten years, the Jaeger was truly the icon of the program, a pinnacle feat of engineering and human ingenuity.

It helped that its pilots were so bizarre. The public loves the eccentric, and Samothes and Samot were as eccentric as they come: A married pair for almost twice as long as they have been co-pilots, and videos of their marital bickering have been trending almost weekly on all the major social media sites since they stepped into the media spotlight. There was something almost electric about them, a type of magnetic pull that never failed to pull one in its orbit.

Hadrian was barely an adult when the first Kaiju emerged from the ocean. He and Rosana, already so in love, clutched at each other in terror and dread as they watched the carnage the beast wrecked. In the coming weeks, they both felt lost, unmoored. They had met at church, after all, both devout believers, but the holy texts had nothing to say about this monster of the sea, seemingly a harbinger of the end of all days.

The first generation of Jaegers was supposed to signal the coming of the messiah for them all, but there were just too many losses to really celebrate the wins. ‘The neural load’, smart-looking commentators on the evening news explained, looking nervous, ‘it was just too much for a person to handle, even without considering the fighting skills necessary to fight off a Kaiju’. Rosana and Hadrian started talking about moving away from Velas – already it was a miracle the coastal city hasn’t been targeted, and what kind of danger could they possibly bring a kid into?

And then Solar Apostle. And then Samothes and Samot.

Hadrian was a devout man. Had always been a devout man. And in that moment, he found something new to believe in.

The entire Shatterdome was talking about the news. ‘Divorce,’ they called it jokingly, before realizing it was nothing to joke about. There were more pilots these days, more Jaeger teams, but Solar Apostle was the best of the best, and losing it was a harsh blow. It was even harsher without any explanation – the higher ups seemed to have all but disappeared, and in the meantime the rumor machine was thriving, as people raised all manners of possibilities.

Illness.

Injury.

Cheating.

It was the last one that really pissed off Hadrian.

“How dare they,” he hissed, glaring at a group of cadets the next table over. “As if either Samothes or Samot would ever-“

Hella rolled her eyes, shoving another spoon full of… something, into her mouth. “Yeah yeah, Samothes or Samot are gifts from god and can do nothing wrong, we know.”

Hadrian colored slightly before huffing. “That’s not – anyway, they wouldn’t. Not when the fate of the world lies on their shoulders.”

“It’s hardly lying only on their shoulders, dude,” Fero piped up from his other side, his food remaining untouched as he busied himself with the tablet he was constructing on the table. “You’re acting as if they are the only pilots we have.”

“Do you have to do this on the table, Fero? People eat here,” sighed Lem, Fero’s on again off again partner. Their drift compatibility was… bizarre, to say the least: While most people has pretty stable drift connections with others, or had them change gradually over months and even years, Lem and Fero’s drift compatibility seemed to fluctuate between one of the highest scores ever recorded to non-existent, almost on a daily basis. It was the only reason they haven’t been deployed yet as actual rangers – they just weren’t reliable. Hadrian couldn’t even begin to try and understand their relationship, so he mostly left them alone, but Hella was fond of them for some reason, hence their current sitting arrangements.

“So? I’m not stopping them from doing that,” Fero waved him off, not even glancing up from his work.

“Most people don’t feel comfortable eating when there are electronics on their plates.”

“Oh, this is rich coming from the guy who puts dissected Kaiju body parts in our SHARED living space.”

“It’s for science, Fero, which you would understand if you just-“

“Alright!” Hella slapped one hand on each of their mouth. “We are not doing this today, thank you.”

Hadrian sighed a sigh of relief, before attempting to get them back on subject. “Of course Samothes and Samot aren’t our only rangers, but their kill rate is equal to none, and their importance to morale is unquestionable. Besides, we don’t have any new teams that can take their place – unless your drift compatibility is stabilizing?”

Fero, who got tired of licking at Hella’s hand without getting any response from her, simply ducked under her hand to reply. “Oh, haven’t you heard? We aren’t doing that anymore.”

“Aren’t… drifting?”

“Aren’t rangering. Figured that wasn’t getting up anywhere, and I was getting real tired of being inside that guy’s head,” he gestured at Lem, who was looking indigent but was still held captive by Hella. “So the head honchoos transferred us to R&D. Got our own lab and everything, though it sucks that I still have to share it with Mr. Sanitation here.”

Hadrian blinked slowly. “W- When did that happen?”

Hella rolled her eyes at him fondly. “Like, a few weeks ago? I think you were too caught up in our second stage simulation final to really notice like, anything.”

Hadrian groaned, still feeling bad for missing Rosana’s birthday during that last round of testing. When he finally got around to calling her, three days later, she was very understanding, which really only made him feel worse about the whole thing. He was supposed to get leave that weekend, to go see her and Benjamin and make it up to her, but with the news who knew if that was still happening.

He was about to ask for more details (and maybe save Lem, who was beginning to look like he would die if he didn’t get to speak soon), when he was cut off by a sudden hush that fell on the room.

“Nurmacher, Varal,” Marshal Ephrim barked from the entrance to the cafeteria, looking at their table. “With me.”

“Ohhhhh,” Fero sing-songed quietly, “Someone’s in troub- Ouch!”

Lem, who had kicked at him underneath the table, ignored him. As Hella and Hadrian stood up from the table, and Lem was finally freed from Hella’s hand, he simply said: “Good luck.”

Hadrian nodded at him as Hella flashed a grin, and off they went after the Marshal.

\---

Hadrian never had the conscious thought that he wanted to be a ranger until much later in his life. With the second and third generation of Jaegers being rolled out, headed by Solar Apostle, he and Rosana decided to stay in Velas despite the danger. It was their home, after all – where they met and fell in love, where they married, where they wanted to raise their kids. “And besides,” Rosana always joked, “I think the fish smell would kill any Kaiju that dared to show its head on our shores.”

And then there was Benjamin, and Hadrian barely had a thought to spare for Kaijus or Jaegers or anything that wasn’t replacing diapers or feeding a toddler. The next few years were exhausting, but also fulfilling in way Hadrian hadn’t experienced outside of his work before. Watching Benjamin take his first steps, say his first word, enter kindergarten and then elementary school – those moments eclipsed everything else.

Until Frostbreath.

The first attack on Velas changed everything.

\---

The Marshal walked through the corridors rapidly, clearly expecting Hadrian and Hella to keep up. Hadrian hasn’t had many dealings with the Marshal before, but he certainly heard of him. A prodigy, apparently, quickly rising through the ranks despite his young age. Not even the loss of his hand hampered him from long; he left the ranks of the rangers and joined the command ranks along with his previous co-pilot, the ranger Throndir. He was a formidable man, and Hadrian had no clue why he wanted to speak to them.

Eventually they arrived at their destination – a quiet room just next to central command, empty this time of day.

“I’m sure you’ve heard about the recent news,” he began without preamble, not even waiting for the two of them to take a sit, as he leaned against the only desk in the room, staring at them.

“Of course,” Hadrian confirmed softly, while Hella simply nodded.

Marshal Ephrim’s lips twisted wryly. “Good to know the rumor machine is still working, even when everything else has gone to hell.” He sighed. Hella and Hadrian exchanged glances.

“Sir?” Hella asked. “What is this about?”

“First of all, nothing that I’m about to say is to leave this room, understood?” Ephrim’s gaze was piercing, and Hadrian found himself nodding without any conscious decision. Next to him, Hella was doing the same.

“Samothes and Samot are indeed breaking up their partnership. Samothes is leaving the ranger program to take charge of the wall initiative.”

Hadrian audibly sucked in a breath. The wall initiative was pretty new, but very promising according to a number of leading engineers and scientists. Hadrian, a man of action, was not fond of the idea of simply closing themselves in and hiding away, but it was hard to deny the allure of constant protection without risk of human lives.

Hella snorted.

“A problem?” Ephrim asked her, raising an eyebrow.

She shrugged. “No offence, sir, but the wall initiative… it’s pretty bullshit, isn’t it?”

Hadrian flinched a bit at Hella talking to a superior officer so bluntly. “I’m sure that Samothes would be an enormous boon to the initiative.”

“That’s really not my concern anymore,” Ephrim cut in before Hella could reply. “I’m left without my leading team, and a pilot short. Samot is staying with the program, but clearly we need to find him a new co-pilot. He hand-picked the two of you for compatibility tests.”

“Sir?!” Hadrian’s voice had gone a bit shrill.

“Objections?”

Objections? To Hadrian possibly drifting with one of the two people he has been – according to his wife, at least – obsessed with since his early 20s?

The noise that came out of his throat could not be categorized as any sort of verbal communication.

Hella smothered a laugh. “That means no, I think.”

Mercifully, Ephrim didn’t feel the need to comment on Hadrian’s sudden lack of control over his mouth. “Good. There is no time to waste – we’ll go to the Kwoon Combat Room immediately.”  He straightened from his slouch and made his way to the door, once again not waiting for them to follow.

Hadrian scrambled up from his sit, stumbling and almost falling flat on his face. Hella’s hand caught him just in time.

“Careful, can’t bloody that pretty face before you meet and get to seduce your golden god,” she teased him quietly, dragging him after her as they followed the Marshal.

Hadrian could feel himself blushing. “He’s not – he’s married! I’m married!”

“Oh don’t even start, I know you and Rosana have an open relationship. And based on some of the rumors I’ve heard, so do they. Huh, do you think they’re also getting divorced, besides annulling their partnership?”

Hadrian frowned. “I hope not.” At Hella’s glance, he hastened to add, “I- I mean, they seem happy, in all their interviews, and it just would be a shame, right, they seem to fit so well-“ He stopped when he realized Hella was laughing at him, and scowled at her. “Stop freaking me out before the test.”

“Just trying to psych the competition,” she answered with a smirk.

“You don’t even like Samot – you think him and Samothes are ‘stuck up.’ You always roll your eyes at them when they’re on the TV.”

“I just think it’s absurd how much the media focuses on their relationship and not like, on their skills as soldiers,” she shrugged. “Anyway, as long as I get to beat up a Kaiju, I don’t really care who I do it besides.”

“You two are falling behind,” Ephrim called from the front, already standing next to the door to the Kwoon Combat Room. Chastened, the two of them stopped talking and jogged to catch up.

They had both been to the dojo a number of times, of course. All trainees have – it was part of the program, sometimes more than 14 hours a day. Not to mention their own compatibility tests. There was talk, in the beginning, of the two of them being drift compatible, and it was tested in this very room. They were, it turned out, but the higher brass was nervous putting two untrained rangers in a Jaeger, and so it was tabled to a later date. Over the months they’ve have used the room a number of times to destress, both of them similar in the way they needed physical stimulation to really let go.

Hadrian had never been this nervous to enter the room before, though. He let the Marshal and Hella enter, before taking in a deep breath and doing so himself.

The room was not too big, although most of it was taken up by the training mat on the ground. The walls were lined with various weapons, as well as instructions and diagrams of training exercises.

But of course, that was not what really caught Hadrian’s attention.

He has seen Samot a bunch of times – both on the TV and on a number of public appearances in the Shatterdome, drumming up morale and talking about the future. It was so completely different to see him right there, just a few meters away, his gaze coming to rest on the three newcomers.

“Ah, Marshal,” he greeted them. “I see your fetching errand was successful.”

“It was pretty difficult but I made it,” was Ephrim’s dry response, as he came to stand next to the only other person in the room, which Hadrian quickly realized was his ex-partner and the current J-Tech Chief and LOCCENT Officer, Throndir.

“Sir!” Hella snapped to attention, and Hadrian quickly copied her, shaking himself from his momentary stupor.

“Cadets Varal and Nurmacher, thank you for joining us,” Samot graced them with a smile. There was something almost predatory about it, and Hadrian fought to ignore the shiver that snuck up his spine. “I trust the Marshal briefed you?”

“Yes Sir!”

“No need for all that formality,” he waved them off. “After all, soon enough one of you might be inside my head.”

“Permission to ask a question, sir?” Hella asked, ignoring his previous statement.

“Granted,” he replied, a smile still playing on his lips.

“The Marshal said you chose us. Out of all the other cadets – why us?”

“Oh? Not confident in your abilities?”

Hella had the audacity to roll her eyes. “I know I’m good. Hadrian is almost as good as I am. But there is more about drift compatibility than being good, no?”

Samot gave her the same look a teacher might give to a prized student. Hadrian couldn’t even be annoyed at her – he wanted to know too, what was it about them that made Samot single them out. What was it about  _ him _ .

“I cannot give you a quantifiable answer, I’m afraid. That’s the thing, about drift compatibility; so much of it is based on sheer instinct, it is… difficult to explain to others.”

“Like talking in a different language to a toddler who barely knows their own native one,” Hadrian murmed, and then flushed when he realized he said it out loud.

Samot’s gaze slid from Hella to him. “I see you’ve been watching our interviews.”

Hadrian flushed even harder. “Just a few, sir.”

“Enough to quote them, certainly.”

“Um, sorry – “

Samot waved him off. “No, no, no need to apologize. It is quite flattering.”

Next to him, Hella coughed, clearly trying to hide a laugh, and Hadrian wanted to elbow her in retaliation. Some kind of a best friend she was.

“If we can get this moving?” Ephrim called, clearly exasperated. “Unlike some of the people in this room, I’m still employed, and have quite a lot to do.”

“Ah, but I  _ am _ employed,” Samot laughed. “Still getting a paycheck, after all.”

“And we’re here to make sure that continues happening,” Throndir spoke up. “So if you please, Cadet Varal, you’ll go first.”

“Sure,” Hella shrugged off her jacket, leaving her in a tank-top that has clearly seen better days, her arm muscles bulging as she did a few stretches. “The usual?”

“If you don’t mind,” Throndir smiled at her as Ephrim took out a tablet, ready to take notes.

Hadrian has seen Hella in combat before, against others and himself, and so the bulk of his attention was taken up by Samot, who was almost…  _ dancing _ , on the mat. There was something hypnotic about his movements – elegant and graceful, yes, but they also had the same predatory hint that his smile had, every move carefully calculated and expertly executed. It was interesting to see him face off such a brute force like Hella – Hadrian was forced to wonder if that was how it went against Samothes, too; how their drift compatibility translated into a physical fight. It must have been something to see: their compatibility was so obvious even when just sitting in an interview talking. Hadrian couldn’t imagine how it must have felt standing in this room watching them fight, each strike of wood on wood a call for action and a surrender all at once.

For Hadrian, the fight seemed to take on forever, but it must have been just a few minutes before Hella clearly overpowered Samot, quickly striking twice and ending the match. It didn’t surprise Hadrian that Hella won, although it seemed like that wasn’t the same for Ephrim and Throndir, who were quietly staring from the side. Hadrian knew Hella’s strength perhaps better than anyone else, and although Samot clearly had the advantage of experience over her, it just wasn’t enough. Hella knew how to read people in a fight better than anyone else he knew, including their teachers, and certainly better than she knew how to read people when  _ not _ in a fight.

He also knew that drift compatibility wasn’t about winning or losing, but he wasn’t sure if that’s what he saw during the fight. They were well-matched, that was obvious, but he just didn’t know if that was enough.

Throndir was the first to get over his surprise. “Excellent, Cadet Varal, thank you. You can step off the mat. Samot, you ready for another one?”

Hadrian tried not to stare as Samot stretched his long limbs, his shoulders moving gracefully. “It would be a sad day indeed when one fight would be enough to tire me. Cadet Nurmacher, ready to join me?”

Hadrian simply nodded, not trusting his voice, and stepped up. He took off his jacket and gave it to Hella, accepting in return the weapon she handed to him.

Probably every ranger or cadet on base has imagined facing either Samothes or Samot. Hadrian definitely has, multiple times. He imagined it would be intense, that he would be quickly overwhelmed - it’s not that he doubts his own skills, but… It’s Samothes. It’s Samot. It should be like facing a force of nature, like facing a Kaiju, a deluge of power and cunning and experience.

And yet, Hadrian isn’t overwhelmed. Every strike of wood on wood is electrifying, every maneuver is an invitation to do better, be faster, as if Samot is asking him to dance to a tune they’ve already heard a million times. Like Hella, Hadrian is no dancer - but unlike Hella, he doesn’t mind not taking the lead in a fight; content to be lead and then lead in return. He concedes his position and Samot takes point, but the next moment he strikes ahead and Samot falls back. 

When Ephrim calls for them to halt, he almost feels disappointed. No, he  _ does  _ feel disappointed. He is sweating, and his body aches. On the other side of the mat, Samot wipes his brow and tosses his hair (somehow still tangle free,  _ how _ ).

“I think we found my co-pilot.”

\---

Losing Fantasmo during the attack on Velas was rough. Not because he and Hadrian were particularly close - they were colleagues for many years, but Fantasmo wasn’t really the kind of person to make  _ friends _ . 

Hadrian and Rosana were probably the closest he ever got to the concept.

When Frostbreath made landfall - when the alarms sounded and emergency services started directing people to shelters - Hadrian was out on an errand on the other side of the city from Rosana and Benjamin. Those few hours of not knowing, of looking at his phone every few seconds and being hit with despair each time he saw ‘No signal’ on the screen, were something he never wished to experience again. He sat in the shelter for the entire night, flinching every time a distant explosion was heard, or when a tremor wrecked the shelter. He prayed, like he always had, only this time he didn’t quite knew who was listening; if  _ anyone  _ was.

When they were finally allowed out - after Stalker Panther confirmed the kill - he immediately made his way to his house, knowing that would be the place to find his wife and son. When he saw the house was empty he almost lost it right there and then, but it was only moments later that he heard Rosana’s shout, and felt small, bony arms latching around his midriff, Benjamin clinging to his back.

It was Rosana who told him, after they calmed Benjamin down and got him to sleep - Fantasmo found them, when they were a few blocks away from the shelter, cut off by a piece of debris from the fight that has already started. He led them through side alleys and secret shortcuts, and bought them just enough time to squeeze into the shelter before it was closed off.

He didn’t make it in.

Standing over his grave, knowing how much he would hate this entirely cliche scenario - Hadrian decided he would become a ranger. 

\---

Drifting with Samot for the first time was… weird. The ranger program doesn’t actually give them a lot of chances to actually drift with each other. So much about the drift is still unknown, and there is fear that repeated drifting with different people could prove damaging. Instead, they use simulations and the Kwoon Combat Room to check viabiliy, and only when absolutely sure did they arrange for actual use of the drifting machines.

In fact, Hadrian has only drifted once before - with Hella, on their second month of training. They’ve met their first day in the program, and it was quite clear they clicked immediately, to the bafflement of many. A church boy like Hadrian, with the ruff and tumble Hella? They were almost as unlikely pair as Lem and Fero.

Drifting with Hella was comfortable. Despite meeting just a short while ago, and despite being generally terrible with people, Hadrian felt like he really  _ knew  _ her. It felt safe, and yet dangerous - not of what they might to to each other, but the possibilities of what they could do together. Hadrian knew that if the brass gave them a Jaeger, they would be unstoppable.

Drifting with Samot was like navigating a maze, blindfolded and upside down.

His mind moved at an astonishing speed. It leaped from subject to subject, from a thought to a consideration to a plan, picking up and discarding ideas faster than Hadrian could comprehend. He didn’t know if he could get sick while in a drift, but it sure felt like his body was hell-bent on finding out.

‘Deep breaths, Hadrian,’ he heard, from outside and inside and nowhere at all. ‘Just let it flow over you. Keep an open mind.’

‘But I need to understand,’ he thought, or said, or imagined. ‘I need guidance.’

A laugh. ‘The drift is not about guidance.It is a partnership.’

A flicker of a memory. Samot and Samothes, standing in their flight suits. Samot and Samothes, standing in their wedding suits. Samot and Samothes, lying down wearing nothing at all - 

A laugh, again. ‘Sorry about that. I suppose you’re not the only one to feel overwhelmed. Your mind is quite fascinating.’

‘It really isn’t,’ Hadrian objected. ‘I’m a simple man.’

‘Who left a wife and a son to fight monsters in a giant metal can,’ Samot (because it  _ was  _ Samot, who else could it be) pointed out. Hadrian should have felt indignated, should have felt judged, but there was no space for that in the drift. 

‘It was the right thing to do.’

‘Ah, Hadrian,’ should there have been such fondness in his voice? They’ve only just met - ‘I do think my husband would quite like you.’

Another flash. Samothes and Samot, arguing. The Wall versus the Jaegers, hiding away versus taking the fight to them, two titans clashing over their desperate fear that they are running out of time,  _ running out of time, they’re getting stronger and bigger and smarter, how can we ever hope to win _ \- 

‘Don’t chase that, Hadrian. Madness lies that way.’

‘You don’t think we can win,’ he thought, or said, or whispered. ‘Neither of you think we can win, but you just… what? Decided to give up in different ways?’

‘It’s not that we don’t think we can win,’ and Samot sounded so, so tired. ‘It’s that I recognize that winning will feel like losing, at the end; that winning will come with so many sacrifices that it might not feel worth it. And he recognizes that I am right, but also that I’m not always the only one who is right, and decided to find a different way.’

‘We can win,’ Hadrian thought, or said, or shouted. ‘We can win, because - because there is no other way. We will win because we must. And the sacrifices we make - we will be the ones to shoulder that burden.’

And he… he projected. He tried to show Samot - show him Velas at spring, the fishermen at the docks laughing while their children eat ice-cream and try to catch fish with their bare hands. He showed him Rosana, the first day he met her, and how she had him on his back in two seconds flat when she thought he was trying to steal her purse. How she still apologizes, half-laughing, years later.

He showed him Benjamin’s birth, how terrified he was to be a dad, how he thought he was going to be terrible at it. How he kinda was, but had help, and how Benjamin was such an easy child to love. He showed him Fantasmo, ornery, pretentious, selfless Fantasmo, who saved the family of a man he claimed to dislike. He showed him the mass at church, and the mess at the Shatterdome, and how he felt at home at both of them. He showed him people, just people, living their lives during the end of days, because that’s what they do. Because that’s what they must do.

Silence, for a few moments. Hadrian felt himself drifting, and wondered for a fleeting seconds what was it like outside this connection - what were the commanding officers and the technicians seeing, while he was in here, trying to convince a legend that they cannot give up. 

‘Samothes once worried that we were… too removed, from the rest of humanity. Holed up at the Shatterdome, discussing the fate of the world on a daily basis, it was easy to forget sometimes that despite what the media might paint, the world doesn’t revolve around us,’ a wondering tone, as if Samot was remembering something from a long time ago. ‘I reassured him that surely we were so concerned with our job, with our duty, to never forget what we were fighting for, but I suppose that there is space for naivety within us all.’

‘You are not naive -’ Hadrian hastened to object, before realizing he was trying to defend the man from himself. He flushed.

Luckily, Samot was not the type to take offense. A laughter, rolling over their connection, bouncing from memory to memory. It felt freer, somehow, less constrained. ‘You’re very sweet.’

Hadrian groaned. ‘Can we, like, wake up, so that I can forget this entire thing happened?’

‘And why would you want to forget?’ a sense of hurt, for some reason, a flicker of disappointment.

‘This wasn’t really very impressive, was it? We connect, and I immediately chase the RABBIT. Then my side of the connection tries to overwhelm you, and I see a memory you clearly didn’t want me to see. Then I  _ yell  _ at you, and then I try and stop you from yelling at yourselves, and this has all clearly been a mistake-’

It felt weird, like the mental equivalent of a hand over his mouth.

‘Oh, hush. Nobody’s first drift goes well - Samothes and I almost killed an entire room of technicians during ours, and that was during an active Kaiju attack. You are doing splendid, in comparison.’

The hand - or, well, the mental equivalent of one - was swept away, to be replaced by a memory.

A young Samothes, standing in the drivesuit room. He was facing Hadrian,  _ no _ , he realized with a jolt, facing Samot. A smile played on his lips, and Hadrian couldn’t breath, couldn’t since he entered the drift, but at this moment was the first time he didn’t feel it missing. It was hard to know if that feeling came from him or Samot.

‘He almost refused to drift with me again, after that disaster,’ the memory was taken, to be replaced by dozens, hundreds of memories of fights and skirmishes, over almost two decades of piloting. They went by too fast for Hadrian to focus on the details, but the feelings of those memories washed over him.

‘We really aren’t that different,’ Samot’s voice was soft, now, and so close it felt like he could touch it. ‘You think me confident, assured in my mind, and yet I’ve been in a constant state of terror since that first drift. It’s simply something that you would have to get used to, I’m afraid.’

‘Used to…?’ 

‘I can hardly let such a capable co-pilot slip from my fingers, no? And after you offered so  _ gallantly  _ to help me carry the burden,’ and Hadrian sure hoped he would get used to Samot’s teasing, if they were to be co-pilots.

Holy shit. Samot wanted them to be co-pilots.

And then a sudden thought, stopping him in his tracks. 

‘I - ah, that is - well,’ he stumbled, trying to ask and also trying to not the ask at the same time.

Samot was amused. ‘Samothes and I are not getting a divorce, Hadrian.’

‘How did you - the drift. Right.’

Another moment of silence caught them, but more peaceful this time, less contemplative. They were probably going to be pulled out soon. Hadrian didn't know how time works, in the drift, but to his exhausted mind it feels like they have been here for hours, at least.

‘Besides,’ Samot finally added, ‘It would be such a shame to divorce him before letting him meet you. The scientists do have theories about the possibility of a three-way drift.’

Hadrian choked on a breath he didn’t have to take.  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> So this ended up being a bit more pre-Hadrian/Samothes/Samot than expected, but I hope you still like it! maybe I'll end up writing a second part in the future.
> 
> some stuff that didn't end up on the actual fic: Hella ends up co-piloting with Adelaide, and they're EXTREMELY terrifying. Their Jaeger's name is Death's Knight.
> 
> Throndir and Ephrim's Jaeger was named Ranged Glory. I'm horrible with Jaeger names.
> 
> Lem and Fero blow up the labs at least ONCE a week, every one just kinda got used to it.
> 
> Adaire is absolutely the technician in charge of the suits, and Hadrian insists she keeps giving him a size that's just a tiny bit too small. She says she has no idea what he's talking about.


End file.
